In the preceding months, Scott had been receiving anonymous phone calls from a man who had reportedly been stalking her.

[1] In June 1980, a man called The Orange County Register, a local newspaper that had published a story on the disappearance, and claimed that he had killed Scott.

Dorothy Scott was a single mother living in Stanton, California, with her aunt and four-year-old son.

[2] She was a secretary for two jointly-owned Anaheim stores, one that sold psychedelic items (i.e. love beads, lava lamps) and the other at a head shop.

Scott's father, Jacob, said his daughter may have dated on occasion but had no steady boyfriend, as far as the family knew.

[2] Months before her abduction, Scott had been receiving strange phone calls at work from an unidentified male.

[1] Because of the calls, Scott began considering the purchase of a handgun;[3] about a week before her disappearance, she started taking karate lessons.

She and another co-worker, Pam Head, left the employee meeting to take Bostron to the emergency room at UC Irvine Medical Center.

[3] At the hospital, medical personnel determined Bostron had suffered a black widow spider bite and treated him; Head said she and Scott remained in the E.R.

They waved their arms to try to get Scott's attention, but the car sped past them and took a sharp right turn out of the parking lot.

At about 4:30 a.m. on May 29,[4] Scott's car, a white 1973 Toyota station wagon, was found burning in an alley about 10 miles (16 km) from the hospital.

[9] About a week after Scott's disappearance, her parents received a phone call from an unidentified man who said, "I've got her" and hung up.

An unidentified man called the front desk at the Orange County Register which had run a story that day about the case.

Pam Head disputed that claim, saying she had been with Scott the entire time and she had not made a phone call.

[6] Authorities strongly suspect that Scott's murder may have been connected to the later disappearance of 25-year-old Patricia Jean Schneider (born January 18, 1957) due to similarities.

On July 31, 1982, early in the morning, Schneider finished her shift at the Palomino Station in Indian Hills, California.